Rocket Lab, the American private aerospace company, reports a successful mission as its Electron rocket lofted the Tsukuyomi-1 radar satellite for the Japanese iQPS company into orbit. The official update appeared on Rocket Lab’s X (formerly Twitter) channel, confirming the completion of the launch and the delivery of the satellite to its target orbit.
The liftoff took place from the spaceport in New Zealand, and Tsukuyomi-1 was placed into a 575-kilometer-high orbit around Earth within 57 minutes of ignition. This event marks a return to flight for Rocket Lab after a pause following a recent failure.
The pause came after a September incident in which a Capella Space Acadia radar satellite payload was lost. On that mission, while the first stage performed as expected, the second stage engine shut down shortly after ignition, preventing the vehicle from reaching the intended altitude. Subsequent investigations traced the fault to an electrical arc in the power supply that caused a short circuit in the batteries. The arc was ultimately linked to an insulation defect that had gone undetected prior to launch.
The Tsukuyomi-1 flight also stands as Rocket Lab’s tenth orbital endeavor of 2023, surpassing the company’s record for a single year and underscoring a resilient return to aggressive launch cadence after the earlier setback.
Earlier industry reporting noted that a competing private space startup, Galactic Energy from China, had experienced a launch failure with its Ceres-1 rocket, emphasizing the high-stakes nature of contemporary small-lift missions and the ongoing challenges across the sector.
Industry observers highlight how the Tsukuyomi-1 mission contributes to broader efforts in space-based radar and Earth observation, aligning with global interest in timely, high-resolution data for defense, meteorology, disaster response, and commercial analytics. The mission illustrates how private launch providers are expanding capability, reliability, and cadence while operators pursue improvements in safety, redundancy, and fault isolation. Citations: Rocket Lab mission update and official statements; industry incident reports related to the prior September launch; public disclosures from Capella Space; sector analyses on small-satellite launches and radar payloads.